Kellner reminds us that, since the beginning of this year, his polling company has regularly asked people about the consequences of leaving the EU. The results have shown no clear trend. Voters have been evenly divided on the economy, jobs and prosperity; few think Britain's influence in the world would increase if we left the EU. There, he avers. nothing in these figures to explain the narrowing of the gap since the summer.

On the other hand, if the hype on immigration is to be taken at face value, we might expect opposition to the EU to be hardening around now, says Kellner.

We have found repeatedly, he says, that a huge source of resentment towards the EU is Britain's inability to keep out immigrants from other member states. The final, transitional, curbs on people settling her from Romania and Bulgaria end in January. This prospect has prompted many news stories and much debate in recent weeks.

The latest YouGov poll for the Sunday Times shows how much Britons dislike this state of affairs, with 70 percent wanting to end the right of EU citizens to come to Britain.

Only 31 percent of respondents accepted the argument put forward by some economists and business leaders that immigration in recent years has been good for Britain's prosperity; 57 percent think our economy, and not just social harmony, has suffered.

However, when YouGov asked people what should be done about immigration from the EU, something curious happened. Says Kellner, we gave people three options – support continued free movement because there is nothing wrong with it; put up with it because we need to obey EU laws even though we don't like it; restrict the right of EU citizens to settle in Britain, even if this means breaking EU laws.

By far the biggest group, 42 percent, wanted Britian to break EU laws and change the rules; 22 percent were happy with the present system, while 20 percent thought we should put up with them even though we don't like them. So, while the present system was disliked by three-to-one, voters were evenly divided (42 percent each) on whether Britain should defy the EU or not.

Kellner thinks these findings provide a clue to the gradual shift in attitudes to EU membership. It has nothing to do, he asserts, with positive enthusiasm for the EU. This remains in short supply.

Today, he says, the question that the referendum debate implicitly poses is, not "do we love the EU? " but "should we put up with it?" He suspects the public mood has shifted not because the positive case for British membership has gained in appeal, but because, as the prospect grows of a referendum in the not-to-distant future, the dangers of departure loom larger in people's minds.

That would be the status quo effect kicking in, and it's a bit early for that. Nevertheless. Kellner says it's not that more people than before think departure would, say, be bad for jobs, but that this issue influences voters more than it did when a referendum was a more distant prospect. The prose of economic calculation is beginning to count for more than the poetry of sovereign pride.

As a result, the man asserts that more of us think we must put up with the EU, despite its faults, rather than take the risks of leaving the club. Indeed, this is roughly the signal that Cameron and William Hague have been sending, as they make clearer than they have in the past that they want Britain to stay in the EU.

Kellner then at least has sufficient humility to qualify his findings with the phrase, "if this analysis is right, then both sides have clear challenges".

Opponents of the EU need to persuade people that (for example) the Confederation of British Industry is wrong, and that leaving the EU would actually be good for jobs and investment. Supporters of the EU need to persuade voters that there is a positive case for the benefits of membership, not merely a negative case for grudging acceptance that it is the less dangerous of two unattractive options.

The man is surely right when he says that "both sides have clear challenges", but his analysis is perhaps not as complete as it could be. Returning to the immigration issue, clearly a lot of people agree with the UKIP diagnosis – which the party mistakes for support – but they do not agree with its solutions, such that they are. Tactically, I think Farage has got it wrong – badly wrong. People share common cause with UKIP about the effects of mass migration, but it is not the vote-winner he thinks it is.

As to the anti-EU sentiment, it may be that the result is a statistical blip, but it does follow the trend and accords with other polls. And that means UKIP is losing the argument. If anything, there is an inverse correlation between the support for UKIP and support for leaving the EU. With the modest increase in support for UKIP, we have seen a decline in the enthusiasm for leaving the EU.

Now, Kellner might interpret the slippage as meaning that more of us think we must put up with the EU, despite its faults. But there are plenty of other interpretations. Not least, as UKIP has reinvented itself as an all-purpose political party, it is gradually vacated the field when it comes to arguing the case for leaving the EU.

Moreover, it has consistently refused to offer a credible (or any) exit plan and it has been way behind the curve on the Article 50 debate. It press effort is abysmal, and it is not making any serious attempt to counter the FUD generated by the other side.

Contrary to Kellner's assertions, therefore, we could simply be seeing a reflection of the inadequacy of UKIP as a campaigning force. Having usurped the position as representing the anti-EU movement, it has actually walked away from the battle and is now losing the argument.

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